1. Field of the Invention
This disclosure relates generally to data processing, and more specifically to methods and systems for acquiring new software applications.
2. Description of the Related Art
Software traditionally was distributed on disk. Acquiring additional software required either a trip to the store or waiting for a package with a disk to be delivered. Then the disk would be inserted into the computer and after a few clicks an installation process would begin. Depending on the number of disks and other factors, the installation process could be long and annoying.
With the rise of the Internet, software increasingly is distributed electronically, over the Internet. In particular mobile devices have made installing software very convenient, with mobile manufacturers mandating relatively small installation packages so that consumers could quickly go from ordering software in the application store to running the software.
However there are applications that require more storage. Download times for games and other content rich media software can be far larger than say a weather application. For instance a large game can require 10-50 Gigabytes of file installs. On a low grade Internet connection this can require a download lasting hours or even days. Thus, the delay between ordering a large application and the time to start using the application becomes increasingly long and annoying to the user.
To minimize this annoyance the downloading and installation of applications has been moved to the background, so that use of the device can continue while a new, large application is being delivered and installed.
Hiding the installation does not solve one concern of the customer, which is, “when will I be able to play this game, or use this application?” If a consumer wants to play a game in twenty minutes and the acquisition process takes five hours, they will be unhappy if they sit around and start waiting.
As games and other large applications have grown larger than our Internet connections have increased in speed, the problem of delays before start of play has also increased. Today many expensive games or applications can take hours from the time they are purchased to the time that a user can start to play the desired game or use the application.
One solution is for large application makers to modify their applications so that only a part, the first part, must be downloaded and installed before the end user can start to use that application. This solution leads to interesting situation. Two applications, both of the same size, say fifty gigabytes, can have very different times to start use, if one application is modified to be split into functional parts, and the other is not. If the modified application first functional part is only one gigabyte then it may take only one-fiftieth as long to start using that one versus the un-modified application.
For the end user eager to begin using an application this time savings is important, and may influence their purchasing decision, somewhat analogous to how movie watchers may choose certain movies based on when they are starting that evening or how long the movie will run. That is, a consumer's desire may be based on how long before the consumer must wait to have that desire fulfilled.
As happy end-users are important to any business, we wish to show end-users how long they will have to wait to use an application if they determine to acquire that application.